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IndustryArena Forum > CAM Software > Autodesk CAM > F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?
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  1. #21
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    Jul 2010
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    178

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Quote Originally Posted by Mecanix View Post
    If the software allows for unwrapping of a surface then you simply need to machine this surface normal to Z with a zig zag pattern and wrap back those points it outputs to the PP via code. To my 'limited' knowledge F360's PP is C powered so it can't be that complicated to code. Bet its been done by a few already, they are just not telling us ;-)
    You're not understanding the difference between a mesh and a solid. Fusion cannot machine meshes... so they are not telling you because it's impossible.

    You can convert your mesh to a solid that fusion can understands, but then you cant unwrap a solid... it's a solid. You can unwrap a mesh because it's a shell... it's simply a surface with no volume. If you unwrapped your mesh and then converted it to a solid so fusion could machine it, then it would be a solid again. So, there is no way to get around this issue.

    In the same way, Vectric can unwrap a mesh but it cannot machine a solid. Thus, Vectric can wrap on the 4th axis, but it cannot index on the 4th axis.

    These limitations are because of the models used and the associated advantages/disadvantages of both.

  2. #22
    Join Date
    May 2015
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    1422

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    ... but you CAN extrude a new surface (thin feature) 0 distance from a face, and use that to define a tooling boundary. If it's on a cylindrical face you can then click the checkbox on a 2d strategy to wrap it.

  3. #23
    Join Date
    Aug 2019
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    339

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Pardon my total ignorance of F360, @FastFarmer. Didn't know you could model meshed surfaces with F360 at the first place. Kinda strange though as I just can't understand how they manage to fit those polygons within that parasolid kernel, which I think is what Autodesk's Fusion & Inventor are licensed with (?).

    So much to discover, so much to learn, so little time :/

    edit: I've just gone google-crazy and it appears as if you can work meshes in F360. Unbelievable!!! And no bloody wonder parts can't be machined LOL holly snap man....
    https://knowledge.autodesk.com/searc...usion-360.html

  4. #24
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    Jul 2010
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    178

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    You can model/work with meshes in fusion, but just not apply meaningful toolpaths to it. You need to convert it to a solid first; which you can also do in Fusion 360.

  5. #25
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    Aug 2019
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    339

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Quote Originally Posted by FastFarmer View Post
    ....which you can also do in Fusion 360.
    No Thank You Very Much! Can't do hybrid CAD, or whatever its called backend-wise. Never had training for that lol
    Need standard CAD nurbs/splines to work out surfaces/edges, prefer control over the points where the stuff sews together. Machinable, at least ;-)
    Call me old-school if you want, don't care...

    Thanks for the heads up, didn't know. Saved me quite a few hours in fact

    ps: a CAD that really caught my attention recently is Freecad. Picked up on this bad boy as a python learning platform during my free-time and I just can't get enough of it. Bet it could cut dharmic's part even with 8axis 'simultaneously' with little prog effort...

  6. #26
    Join Date
    Aug 2005
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    205

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Thought I'd add my voice to the mix in the event that Autodesk is listening. Attached is a chair part I'd like to mill on a 4th axis. I believe the dowel hole and the saddle joint on opposite ends could be easily done via indexing. But the real challenge is the second operation mounting the part between centers and final milling the surface in one pass. And much like 5 axis continuous , tilting the ball end bit at something other than surface normal to optimize cutting geometry for a clean cut. Fusion 360 should be able to address this (hopefully). Maybe not now, but soon? I know there are ways to do this now via indexing, but it would require some additional geometry and there will always be visible transitions, one side to the other. If anyone out there knows of other options for doing this, I'd love to hear them.

    Marv

  7. #27
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    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Quote Originally Posted by MARV View Post
    Fusion 360 should be able to address this (hopefully). Maybe not now, but soon?
    Nope.. it's impossible. In this case I would think fusion will not recognize this shape as a cylinder and there is no face to wrap.
    I will have a play with this in the next day or two, but you need to appreciate fusion is an engineering based tool, not an art based one.

    There are a couple of mesh based cams that will wrap this no issue.

  8. #28
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    4252

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Seems to me it would be easier to just work out the maths and write your own g-code.
    (Meant quite seriously.)

    Cheers
    Roger

  9. #29
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    Aug 2005
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    205

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    The chair part in question was done in Rhino. Not an engineering program per se, but quite capable as a solids modeler. And I've used Rhino Cam in the past to do similar surfaces. Retired now, I don't have the $$$ for Rhino Cam, so Fusion is probably going to be the tool of choice.

    I'm a ways off to a 4th axis for my machine, so I hope that further development in Fusion will come by the time I'm set up.

    Marv

  10. #30
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    Jul 2010
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    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    My suggestion would be if you want to machine these type of objects on a forth axis, then go get yourself a copy of vcarve.

  11. #31
    Join Date
    Mar 2003
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    35538

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    For wooden parts like that, get Deskproto, which can do continuous rotary. But I'd still do the joinery as separate toolpaths with indexing.

    People have been asking for continuous rotary in Fusion 360 for a long time. I don't see it coming any time soon.
    Gerry

    UCCNC 2017 Screenset
    http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2017.html

    Mach3 2010 Screenset
    http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2010.html

    JointCAM - CNC Dovetails & Box Joints
    http://www.g-forcecnc.com/jointcam.html

    (Note: The opinions expressed in this post are my own and are not necessarily those of CNCzone and its management)

  12. #32
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    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Quote Originally Posted by FastFarmer View Post
    Nope.. it's impossible. In this case I would think fusion will not recognize this shape as a cylinder and there is no face to wrap.
    I will have a play with this in the next day or two, but you need to appreciate fusion is an engineering based tool, not an art based one.

    There are a couple of mesh based cams that will wrap this no issue.
    I had a play with the multi axis flow tool path last night. As suspected it wont recognize shapes like this as a cylinder, so forget it.
    I guess it's worth also pointing out that this limitation doesn't just apply to 4th axis, but also 5 axis. Again this limitation is due to the model type being a solid. So if you thought wow, I can simultaneous machine my model on 5 axis with fusion 360.. you can forget that too.

    Interesting discussion. It shows that although fusion has been smart in cornering the market with its free software, there is still a future for hobby type mesh based modelling cam with companies like Vectric and Deskproto.

  13. #33
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    Aug 2015
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    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Quote Originally Posted by dharmic View Post
    Hi all

    Whilst Fusion 360 has continually impressed me with the quality of its toolpaths and just how easy they are to create, its support for 4th axis continuous machining has left me either confused, disappointed or both. As far as I've been able to find, it will let us wrap 2D toolpaths around a cylinder centred on the axis but that's about it.

    Here's a a couple of typical ops I'd like to perform but that I can't work out how to set up and I'm hoping someone out there is going to reply with "Idiot: it's easy, just select strategy X and enable option Y."

    1. "surface" a cylindrical face which is not concentric with the 4th axis. For example, if I want a piece of flat bar stock which has a slight belly on one side. At the moment I am stuck with indexing the 4th to set that face upward then doing a 3D path. I'd kinda like to get that 4th axis live for this operation to keep the tool tip normal to the model surface. Easy with the swarf op if you have a 5A machine, but nothing for "just 4th"?

    2. Spiral cut around a form. Using the tip of the tool, again normal to the model surface, I'd like to be able to start at one end of the workpiece and spiral up to the other, cutting the outside of a smooth model. Sort of like a contour strategy wrapped around the part.

    Am I thinking about all this the wrong way? Or have I missed something simple and obvious for doing it? Or have Autodesk just not implemented 4A support?

    Thanks in anticipation of any help!
    Use the rotary toolpath.

    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Honeyview_Annotation 2020-04-26 202524.jpg  

  14. #34
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    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Good explanation here - https://youtu.be/Frr8m9uILfk

  15. #35
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    May 2015
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    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    New toys! Thanks schneik, exactly what I was looking for back in September. Grump grump "where is this rotary thing" this morning, did an update et voila - simple and exactly what I was after. Whether the latest version took it out of experimental mode or it was how I picked up the freebie manufacturing extension I don't know, will find out in June I guess

  16. #36
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    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Quote Originally Posted by dharmic View Post
    New toys! Thanks schneik, exactly what I was looking for back in September. Grump grump "where is this rotary thing" this morning, did an update et voila - simple and exactly what I was after. Whether the latest version took it out of experimental mode or it was how I picked up the freebie manufacturing extension I don't know, will find out in June I guess
    Yeah, thanks schneik. I've been playing with this for a while now, and although I've had to do quite a bit of fiddling with my post to stop unwinds etc, the rotary tool path on both horizontal and vertical works amazingly well.

    A remaining issue I have is where a following rotary toolpath from another rotary toolpath continues from the axis position of the old one, where it would be better it reset to A0 again. Not sure how I can fix that?

  17. #37
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    Jun 2010
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    4252

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    There is a guide to Coordinate Spaces at the Artsoft web site which discusses this for Mach3:
    Coordinate Spaces - a Guide

    You can reset the A axis value in Mach3 in several ways, not all of which are useful. The following code block works on my machine
    #99803=0
    G28.1 A0
    #99803=0

    No guarantees of course.

    Cheers
    Roger

  18. #38
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    Jul 2010
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    178

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Hi Roger,

    I use Linuxcnc, the post code in fusion for bypassing unwind is -
    writeBlock(
    gMotionModal.format(0),
    conditional(abcFormat.format(abc.x) == 0, "G10 L20 P#5220 A[#5423 MOD 360]")
    );

    With this whenever you issue a A0 comand, it will insert this code before A0 and always return it to the 0 within 1 revolution (See code below)

    But that's not the issue I am talking about. What I am saying is if you program one rotary path following another the code will look something like -

    N74405 Z15.403 A-26305.368
    N74410 Z15.401 A-26352.635
    --
    --
    N74465 G49
    (ROTARY1 2)
    N74470 G53 G0 Z0.
    N74475 G10 L20 P#5220 A[#5423 MOD 360]
    N74480 A0.

    N74485 G0 X0.098 Y0.
    N74490 G43 Z31. H31
    N74495 G0 A-26370.
    N74500 Z5.371

    As you can see the last rotary was A-26352.635 but when you start a new tool path you issue an A0 and then start from where you left off A-26370. This means you goto A0 but then must wind back.

    You could remove the A0, but in the post processor this has effects on other toolpaths such as adaptive clearing that issue A0 for positioning. What needs to happen is the rotary tool path needs to start from A0 again, not the old position.

    If you separate the posts then it starts from 0, but not really ideal.My work around at the moment is simply to delete A0 from g-code.
    Cheers

  19. #39
    Join Date
    May 2015
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    1422

    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    Hey Roger

    Thanks for posting that link (and the original doc). Reading through it now when I should be doing something else because ~finally~ it's all starting to come together in my head instead of being a bunch of disconnected "oh this does this, that does that" snippets. Great stuff!

    Anyone else: don't forget to flick through to the last page and get the last version instead of the one on the first page.

    FastFarmer just a thought: if you're resetting the machine workspace you're going to have to reset the workspace in the toolpath as well. Perhaps in the post for each of the operations? Or as a manually inserted block between them?

  20. #40
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    Re: F360 - spiral toolpath on 4th axis?

    @farmer: Ah, I don't know LinuxCNC, so can't help.
    @dharmic: I wrote that document initially to get it sorted out in MY head!

    Cheers
    Roger

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